Saturday, January 09, 2010

Literary newsbits: Obsessions, Nymphos, Cosmos Latinos

Rio Grande Review is accepting submissions for its upcoming spring issue with the theme of Obsession / Aversion:

"Obsessions can be plaguing and oftentimes, dictate the direction and content of our writing. Here at the RGR office we are especially fascinated with the idea that to some degree, all writers are 'obsessionists.' What we find even more interesting though, is that at times we become obsessed with our aversions. With this in mind, we're asking that texts submitted for our Spring 2010 edition consider this dynamic in some fashion. Whether this means writing about an obsessive aversion, an aversion, obsession, or how the two complement and direct/enhance/or inform one another, that's up to you.

"We accept writing of all kinds, including but not limited to: fiction, poetry, non-fiction, memoir, flash fiction, translation, essays, screenwriting, and plays. We accept texts written in English, as well as texts written in Spanish. Texts are published in the language they were originally written in.

"We encourage the submission of art (all mediums), photography, experimental texts, visual poetry, etc. Animations and audio files are only considered for our online edition. Deadline for this spring issue is February 5, 2010. Contributors receive two copies of the magazine, S&H paid.

"RIO GRANDE REVIEW is a non-profit bilingual publication run by students of the MFA in Creative Writing at The University of Texas at El Paso. RGR has been promoting creative writing in El Paso, the US-Mexico border, and worldwide for over ten years. Our intent is to publish excellent quality work, but at the same time, attract diverse and daring texts that experiment with form. We are striving to forge an identity as a cutting edge review that exists as space for diverse voices: writers who may be multilingual, cross-genre, or experimenting with narrative and poetic form. We also want to be a starting place for new writers."

Over at the Biting Edge, Mario Acevedo of vampire Felix Gomez fame blogs about his great news:"I'm proud to say that my debut novel, The Nymphos of Rocky Flats, was named by Barnes & Noble as one of the Best Paranormal Fantasy Novels of 2000-2009. I share the limelight with the big kahunas of urban fantasy such as Kim Harrison, Laurell K Hamilton, Jim Butcher, and Charlaine Harris."

Over at SciFiLatino, you should check out the major book review (in two parts) of Cosmos Latinos: An Anthology of Science Fiction from Latin America and Spain (edited By Andrea L. Bell & Yolanda Molina-Gavilán, Wesleyan University Press, 2003)

"There are many Science Fiction authors that write in Spanish, but unfortunately few are translated into English (especially short stories) so Cosmos Latinos was a surprising find. Besides 27 short stories, it contains an interesting introduction about the development of science fiction literature in Latin America. I’ll sum up the intro here since it has some interesting points and in the next post I review the actual stories.

"The second post briefly describes the 27 short stories in the book without spoilers, except for the first two essay-type stories. The 27 were selected to represent different authors and different “eras” of Latin American science fiction. Each story is preceded by a short biography."

3 comments:

Coincidence, or cosmic convergence? I just got my hands on Rosaura Sánchez and Beatrice Pita's Lunar Braceros 2125-2148, published by the significantly outstanding Calaca Press out of National City, La Frontera Califas.